Paternity testing is a major US industry. Between 1970 and 1996, the number of divorced persons has more than quadrupled, from 4.3 million to 18.3 million according to a 1998 report by the Commerce Department's Census Bureau. Hundreds of thousands of paternity tests are performed each year.

What Makes A DNA Test Court Admissible?: The difference between results being court admissible or not court admissible is based upon the properly documented chain of custody. Home DNA test kits are normally not court admissible because the DNA samples cannot be verified.

Criminal Paternity: The most common and most disturbing criminal paternity cases are those involving the sexual abuse of a child.

The Paternity Test Results: Results are presented by a signed and notarized laboratory report. The results will either state that the alleged father is excluded from being the father or it will provide a probability of paternity relationship as a percentage equal to or greater than 99%. See this section for a sample inclusion (is the father) and exclusion (is not the father) report.

Paternity State Case Law: A collection of relevant paternity cases state-by-state with short analysis. These paternity cases have been selected because they represent landmark court decisions.

NO CONSENT AGREEMENT -- A man cannot enter into a consent agreement with a woman to impregnate her, and then contend that he is but a sperm donor without a responsibility to pay support, nor can the woman who becomes pregnant as a result waive child support. Courts have ruled that, outside of artificial insemination, a man cannot waive his parental rights (or the responsibility of child support), nor can a mother.

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